To wonder if I should be worried about DS?

[Everchanginggnome]

My DS is 17 mo. He's always been strong willed since around 8mo or so, but recently it's something else. He is heavily into tantrums, I mean throwing himself onto the floor and screaming at the top of his voice, he's even started head butting the floor and now has a bruise on his forehead. During a tantrum he often pulls my hair hard, and has also just started smacking me in the face. He does this to his DP aswell. These tantrums are happening more and more frequently and seem to be getting more outrageous. They can happen for very very small things and he can also cry to the point where it sounds like he's in pain- even though I know he's not. He also screams a very loud high pitched squeel at the top of his voice ALOT. He is extremely destructive, and tends to try and dismantle everything and anything in his path. He seems to deliberately do the things he knows he's not supposed to for attention. Going out with him anywhere is becoming to the point where we know a major tantrum is definitely going to happen.
When he's not kicking off he's a happy clever little boy. His speech is really good I think (I'm biased ofc) but he is saying quite a lot of words and is very switched on- he will go and get a certain thing for me when I ask him etc, names objects and facial features,builds towers with his Duplo Lego etc. I don't have any concerns about his development.
Ofc I understand he's a toddler, and a little boy at that, and a lot of this is commonplace, I'm fully aware how frustrating for them- I just wasn't expecting this, so badly before 2. The health visitor told me recently if the terrible twos come early it can be a sign of intelligence or benign advanced which could be the case but I'm not sure. I'm a FTM so I have no other children to compare this behaviour to (although I know they're all different!)
Am I being silly to worry? Is it normal for him to so highly strung and get so stressed so easily?

I wouldn't worry if he's talking, tbh.

Sounds pretty normal to me, especially if he seems happy in between tantrums!

*be a sign- not benign!

Do you have my ds2 living with you. That's him to a tee. Utterly bonkers, determined and borderline suicidal. Very affectionate and everyone keeps reassuring me it's just a sign of his inner genius . He's one of four and a twin-send gin!

My dd does the head banging hair pulling thing (she is 2 months younger than your DS) but it isn't that often (maybe once a fortnight). I think it's quite normal for this age as they can't communicate fully even when they are good at talking

I was reading this post agog because I thought you were talking about a seventeen year old teenager and couldn't even begin to think why you WOULDNT be worried about that!

I am not a parent but sounds like normal toddler tantrums to me??

It sounds pretty normal. The tantrums can seem so at odds with their happy personalities. Be firm and consistent with the face slapping (my 16 month old will bite and then grin at me). Even my massively communicative eldest dd was frustrated at this age.

Don't panic, nothing wrong there. It is a horrible shock when the tantrums start isn't it? They have so much going on in those little heads and expressing it all is such hard work.

bertiesgal sending him your way!! I'm glad to hear my son isn't the only one!

I suspected it was normal but I have found myself recently thinking 'what the f*ck is going on here?!' as he's screaming and rolling round the floor, head butting it hard, and then screaming in pain, all because his toast wasn't instant and has to be toasted first

I hear of people talking about their 'placid' or 'chilled' toddlers- and know that as happy and as funny as he can be, he is in no way ever a 'placid' child!

mission fingers crossed all this has stopped by the time he is 17yo

justified yer it's definitely a shock! Who are you and what have you done with my baby?!

If his speech and understanding are good, have you tried letting him know that you understand what he wants?

So if he's tempering to go outside for example, say 'I know you're really upset because you want to go outside. We can't right now.... I know you just really want to go out, it's not fair.... etc'

Sometimes they temper trying to communicate/think you don't understand what they want. Just acknowledging why they are upset can often be enough to stop them tempering.

When you say they happen for very very small things, to your DS, they are probably massive, very important things. So his biscuit breaking when he didn't want it to or you passing him the wrong colour car or something might seem like the end of the world to him.

When my DS was about the same age, he had a really bad fall one day. We were on holiday and going round the table at dinner time, all saying our best and worst thing of the day. I was prompting DS to say his fall but he said 'no. naa-naa (banana). broke'. His banana had snapped when I was unpeeling it earlier in the day and it was the last one. It had obviously really upset him, much more than his head nearly splitting open so sometimes the most trivial things can be devastating to a one year old.

Large travel cot worked well for my head butter when he lost the plot as I could happily ignore once placed until he chilled out. Cuddling got me bit or slapped when in a strop

littletwofeet I do try to reassure him but I will try and do it more often! That's a good point about little things seeming massive to them! His temper is just unreal ATM.

allthewaves that's a good idea thankyou. I'm not sure if it's too young for the time out thing but I feel like he needs times outs a lot recently!

The 'instant' thing, so him asking for toast and not being able to wait is developmental. He probably doesn't grasp that he is able to communicate he wants toast but is not getting it immediately.
All the other things he asks for (so him saying 'ball' 'car' for example when playing and you pass them to him) happen straight away so why wouldn't the toast????!!!

Taking him into the kitchen with you, letting him watch, saying 'I know you want the toast right now, it's hard to wait isn't it' can help. Telling him good boy for waiting,etc.

My health visitor told me the terrible twos as a lie, its actually the terrible thirteen months to 5 years old, and for ds2 that seems accurate. He is honestly the exact same as you're (he's now 4 and is slowly calming down) but at your ds's age he was like a changeling. I was always covered in bite marks or scratches, every single day we had a tantrum that lasted for at least and hour, he would bang his head so hard on things he would be bruised, I once videod it in case people thought I was hurting him. As he got better at expressing himself (he was an early talker but still had all these feelings he couldn't express) he stopped tantruming so much. What also helped was when he started I'd say "now I know you can hear me, I love you very much but I'm not going to watch you like this, so I'm going to go into the kitchen and when you feel ready for a cuddle I'll be right here for you". I felt like such a bitch saying that, and was so worried he would do himself harm with me out the room, but the truth is when he was on a rampage I couldn't do anything to stop him anyway so me being there made no difference, I made sure I could keep and ear out for him. Then once he'd calmed we would try and talk through what happened and how we could prevent it next time. Eventually the tantrums got shorter and shorter. He hasn't had an proper one in months now. There is a light I promise!!

I agree with PP that empathising can really help diffuse toddler tantrums.

I wouldn't use time out at all, he can't help tantrumming - instead stay close to him and support him through these feelings. Imagine being so upset and frustrated that you had to bang your head on the floor!

He needs you to help him learn to regulate these feelings. If he's got good speech that's great. Look up emotion coaching.

A good way of helping him to regulate the feelings is to name them. So saying 'do you feel really cross' 'I can see you feel very angry' 'it must be making you feel frustrated' etc.

You want to teach him that's it's fine to have these feelings but help him to learn a different way to express/manage them but that will come in time.

If he's speaking well, it should make it easier as he'll be able to tell you what the matter is more easily and you can have a better conversation with him.

Agree definatley not time out, that is more for older children who make a conscious decision to do something and you can pre-warn, for example, if you carry on drawing on the furniture you will go in time out. But there are usually other/better ways to manage most behaviours anyway.

I know this isn't the same, but something someone pointed out to me recently (prob on here) is that very little ones can't tell the time. So saying to your kid "we're leaving in 10 mins" means nothing. And to a parent, 10 mins can mean 30 seconds (particularly if they're in a situation they want to get out of, or have needs of other family members to take into account, etc, etc, etc) or could mean anything up to 45 minutes (if you're having a great time), and the message I learned is to be consistent so your child can learn.

I don't know why your kid tantrums, and you've had some good advice already. But I recommend being consistent and saying what you mean or explaining why not (because life's like that!). Also (and this has been said up-thread) using emotional literacy language. Which is a posh way of saying "name the emotions". So if your child is laughing and happy, state "you seem happy". If your child is crying "you are sad! :)". If they're angry "you are really angry and cross".
They way they'll learn is if you name it, make it safe for them, and model it.

Good luck.

That was supposed to be a sad face emoticon. #fail

#old and useless